1967: Jef Raskin (Mac creator) writes Ph.D. thesis on the Graphical User
Interface (GUI) at Penn State University. In his thesis he coins the term "QuickDraw" for
the first time. This will eventualy become the name of the Mac's graphics
routine 17 years later.

1970: Xerox opens Palo
Alto Research Center (PARC), and employs the greatest minds in the
field to research advances in computer science. Raskin begins to take several
trips to PARC as a visiting scholar
for the Stanford Artificial Intelligence Laboratory.

1972: Jobs becomes one of the first 50 employees at Atari, under Atari
founder Nolan K. Bushnell. Jobs later asks Woz for help in creating the sequel
to the smash hit "Pong", entitled "Breakout". Jobs cheats
Woz out of $5000.

1973: PARC finishes work on the
$40,000 Alto. It becomes the first true PC, and first GUI-operated computer.
It also used the first laser printer, and was connected to other Altos using
the first Ethernet network.

1975: Woz begins attending meetings of the Homebrew Computer Club. Woz
becomes intrigued by the Altair 8800 often shown there. He cannot afford
one so he decides to build his own microcomputer. Work begins on the Apple
I.

1976

March: Woz finishes work on the Apple
I. He first asks his employer, Hewlett
Packard, if they are interested in an $800 machine that runs BASIC.
All the departments in HP turns down his offer.

April 1: Apple Computer Company is founded by Steve Wozniak, Steve Jobs,
and Ron Wayne.

May: $666.66 Apple
I introduced at the Home Brew Computer Club meeting. Paul Terell, president
of Byte Shop chain, makes 50 orders.

August: Jobs asks his former boss, Nolan Bushnell, for information on investors.
Bushnell recommends Don Valentine, who in turn recommends Mike Markkula,
who becomes a key person in Apple's history for over twenty years.

October: Commodore buys MOS Technology, the company who makes the processors
powered by the Apple
I and II.

1977

January 3: Apple Computer, Inc. is
officially created after the company is incorporated. Mike Markkula invests
$92,000 in Apple, with intent to invest $250,000.

June 17: Jobs' daughter, Lisa Nicole, is born out of wedlock. He initially
denies the possibility of being the father, but came to accept her.

1979

January: Daniel Fylstra writes CalcuLedger (later to become VisiCalc).
Offers it to Apple and Microsoft for $1 million. Both turn him down.

Spring: Raskin refuses proposal to work on Annie Project, a $500 game machine.
Suggests a GUI project instead.

May: Raskin writes proposal for the PITS (Person In The Street's) Computer.
It would supposedly to solve the complexities of the Apple
II.

June: Apple
II+ introduced for $1195.

July 30: The Lisa Project,
a $2000 Apple
III-like computer, begins under Ken Rothmuller. Expected release was
March 1981.

August: Apple liscenses AppleSoft BASIC from Microsoft for
$21,000. Written by Randy Wigginton, who also created MacWrite.

September: Raskin gets approval to begin work on Macintosh Project, a $500
portable computer smilar to his PITS proposal.

October: Fylstra releases VisiCalc. It becomes one of the most successful
programs ever, being the first "killer app".

November: Jobs takes his first visit to PARC in
exchange for allowing Xerox to invest
$1 million in Apple.

December: Jobs returns to PARC with
several vice presidents and management heads.

1980

March: Lisa project
revamped to include all the features of the Alto, with several more. Rothmuller
complains the specs are too much to be accomplished if they want to retain
the current release schedule and keep the final price reasonable. Jobs fires
Rothmuller for "not cooperating", later replaced by John Couch.

Summer: Jobs hires 15 Xerox employees
to work on the Lisa Project.

May 19: The Apple
III is released at the National Computer Conference (NCC) for $4340
to $7800 depending on configuration.

December 12: Apple goes public. Apple's share rises 32% that day, making
40 employees instant millionares. Jobs, the largest shareholder, makes $217
million dollars alone. Markkula makes $203 million that day, an incomprehensible
220,700% return on investment . Neither Jef Raskin, nor Daniel Kottke (one
of the original Apple employees) were allowed to buy stock and so made no
money during this time.

1981

January: Jobs forces himself into the Macintosh Project, after earlier
dismissing and often trying to cancel it.

March: Mike Markkula becomes president of Apple. The original ship date
for the Lisa is
missed, coming out 3 years later.

June: An improved variation of the Alto, the $16,595 Xerox Star
is introduced at NCC. It included dragging and double clicking of icons.

August 12: IBM introduces the IBM PC
for $1565. With 16k RAM, a 5.25" floppy drive, running the first version
of MS-DOS, it is a rather pitiful computer that rarely reached the efficiency
of the Apple
II released 4 years earlier. Nevertheless, it becomes an instant success.

1982

January 22: Jobs convinces Bill to write a BASIC interpreter for the Mac.
This will become the failed MS BASIC.

February: The Mac case-design is finished and finally approved. All the
signatures of the members of the project are placed inside the mold.

March 1: After Jobs forces Raskin out of the Macintosh project, he officially
resigns.

July 30: The applications bundled with the Lisa finally
work together under the OS for the first time.

September 1: Lisa is
declared ready for market.

Late in the year: Chiat/Day writes "1984" ad,
originally for the Apple
II. It is never run.

1983

January 19: The Lisa is
introduced for $9998. The Apple
IIe is introduced for $1395, later aguably becoming the most successful
and most popular Apple computer. It will be produced for 10 and a half more
years.

Spring: Chiat/Day rewrites "1984" for
use in the now famous commercial advertising the Macintosh during Super Bowl
XVIII.

May: Apple enters Fortune 500 at #411 after only five years of existence.
It becomes the fastest growing company in history.

April 8: JObs convinces John Sculley, tehn president of PepsiCo, to become
president and CEO of Apple.

May 16: The original ship date for the Macintosh at the NCC is missed.

September: Lisa released
without bundled software for $6995.

October 7: The Macintosh Introduction Plan, a list of popular developers
and celebrities that are invited to beta-test the Mac, is written.

November: The Lisa and Macintosh divisions
are combined to form the Apple 32 SuperMicro Division.

December: The Apple III+ is introduced for $2995. It replaced the defective
Apple III models.

December 15: Chiat/Day airs "1984" for
the first time. It was aired in the sign-off slot of KMVT Channel 11, at
1:00 AM (coincidentally, on my third birthday). This is customary for the
company, so it can be elligible for the advertising awards issued that year.

Bill Gates first announces Windows, and how the GUI will revolutionize
the PC. Microsoft will not release it for 4 more years.

1984

January 17: The 30-second version of "1984" appears in theater
previews across the country. It was so admired, it was often replayed for
free.

January 22: Apple airs "1984" during the third quarter
of Super Bowl XVIII to a crowd of

January 24: $2495 Macintosh and
$3495 Lisa
2 introduced.

April 24: Apple
IIc introduced at the Apple Forever Conference in San Diego. The Apple
III+ is finally discontinued.

September: Apple
IIc wins Industrial Design Excellence Award.

Microsoft announces and released Word, Multiplan, File, Chart, BASIC, and
other programs.

1985

January: Apple renames the Lisa 2/10 the Macintosh XL, and discontinues
all other Lisa configurations.

January 20: "Lemmings" commercial bombs at Super Bowl XIX.

March: Apple
IIe enchanced introduced.

April 29: Macintosh XL discontinued.

May 15: The last Lisa/Mac
XL is produced at a Carrollton, Texas factory. Sun
Remarketing buys thousands of the last Lisas, and is able to sell most
of them at fair prices after upgrading them with current Macintosh technology.

May 24: Jobs tries to force Sculley out of Apple by forming a coup against
him.

May 31: Jobs is stripped of all his duties. He job description becomes "global
thinker", and his remote office dubbed "Siberia".

September 12: Jobs announces intent to create new company with other "lower-level" employees.

September 17: Jobs distributes his resignation letter to Apple and several
other news media figures.

September 23: Apples files suit against Jobs. Apple claims Jobs knows sensitive
technology secrets that he might use in his new company.

November 22: Sculley signs agreement to let Bill Gates use Mac technology
in Windows, if Microsoft continues to produce products for the Mac.

Microsoft releases Excel for Macintosh.

1986

January: Apple settles law suit against Jobs out of court. Jobs agrees
not to hire any Apple employees for 6 months, and to always make computers
that are more powerful than anything Apple has to offer...yes, you read right.

February: Jobs finishes selling all but one of his 6.5 million shares of
stock to begin NeXT, Inc.

June: Paul Rand, responsible for the IBM logo,
designs the NeXT logo and suggests the use of the small "e".

September: The Apple
IIGS is introduced for $999.

Aldus introduces the TIFF format, later to become the desktop publishing
standard. Compaq introduces the first
Intel 386 PC, replacing IBM as the PC technology
leader.

1987

January: Apple renames the Lisa
2/10 the Macintosh
XL, and discontinues all other Lisa configurations.

January 3: Apple celebrates its tenth birthday. A coffee table book, So
Far, later chronicles the experiences of the last ten years.

Early in the year: Ross Perot invests $20 million in NeXT,
Inc.

Spring: Projected release of first NeXT machine. The NeXT Computer would
be a year and a half late.

March 17: Apple declares 6 different Mac Pluses the 1 milionth Mac. Raskin
is presented with one of them, which he still uses.

August 11: Microsoft releases the first version of its GUI OS, Windows
1.01. It's arcane user interface is almost unsuable, a large disapointment.

The IIe
extended is introduced. Raskin releases the Canon Cat, a computer that
was much more like his PITS proposal several years back. Though it fails
to become popular due to lack of production by Canon, it wins several design
awards.

1988

January: Microsoft releases the second version of Windows, version 2.03.
Seeing as 1.01 was almost unusable, many improvements (much of which was
taken from the Mac) were made. Such include Mac-like icons, and overlapping
instead of tiling windows. Even so, Windows was still not up to par to the
first Alto OS, written 15 years before.

September: The Apple
IIc+, the last in the Apple II line, is introduced. GS/OS System 1,
a Mac-like GUI for the IIGS,
is introduced.

October 12: the NeXT Computer is released for $6500. It included a 25 MHz
'30 processor, 8 MB RAM, 250 MB optical disk drive, math co-processor, digital
processor for real time sound, faxmodem, and a 17" monitor. Apple's
newest Mac was half as fast, with no peripherals for $1000 more.

September 18: The NeXTstep OS is introduced. It will eventually be bought
by Apple and used in its next generation OS, Rhapsody.

1990

February: Dan'l Lewin, a NeXT founder, resigns.

May 22: Windows 3.0 released

September 18: The NeXTstation is released for $4995, one year after the
introduction of the NeXTstep OS. It used the new 25 MHz '40, 2.88 MB floppy
drive, 105MB HD, 8MB RAM, and monochrome monitor. Also introduced was the
NeXTstation Color for $7995 with a 16" monitor capable of 4,096 colors,
and 12 MB RAM. The $7995 NeXTcube was next, with the same configuration as
a NeXTstation Color except it could use a 32-bit video board for 16.7 million
colors in Adobe's Display Postscript.

1991

January: Microsoft releases the second version of Windows, version 2.03.
Seeing as 1.01 was almost unusable, many improvements (much of which was
taken from the Mac) were made. Such include Mac-like icons, and overlapping
instead of tiling windows. Windows was still not up to par to the first Alto
OS, written 15 years after the release of Win 2.03.

April: Susan Barnes, a NeXT founder, resigns.

April 12: Sculley gives a demonstration to IBM engineers
of a IBM PS/2 Model 70 running Pink, a now defunct object-oriented OS that
made IBM-compatible computers look a lot like Macs running System 7.

June: Ross Perot, one of NeXT's board of directors and founder, resigns
saying it was one of his biggest mistakes.

July 3: IBM sent a letter of intent to
Apple, saying it would help finish Pink and liscense its RISC processor in
the works (PowerPC).

October 2: The Apple/IBM alliance becomes
official. Among the many agreements, Apple and IBM will
create PowerPC-based machines and produce two companies, Taligent and Kaleida.
The former a now-defunct company that worked on the now-defunct Pink, the
latter a company that produces multimedia tools.

January 22: Steve Jobs announces NeXTstep 3.0, NeXTstep 486, a version
of NeXTstep that could run on an Intel 486 simultaneously with MS-DOS, and
promises 33 MHz '40 processor versions of the NeXTcube and NeXTstation/Color
at the NeXTWORLD Expo in San Fransisco. NeXT would eventually move its OS
entirely to the Intel x86 platform.Coincidently, the exposition is held at
the same time and in the same city as the Macworld Expo.

March-May: Microsoft introduces Windows 3.1. Microsoft does not make another
update (besides 3.11) for 3 years. Even today Windows 3.1 has about 40% market
share. Windows 95 and Mac OS are both at around 16-17%.

Late September: NeXTstep 3.0 is released.

June: Bud Tribble, a NeXT founder, resigns.

1993

January: Rich Page, a NeXT founder, resigns.

February 10: Jobs lays off 280 of his 530 NeXT employees on "Black
Tuesday". Sells his hardware line to Canon, and tries to become a Microsoft-like
company by concentrating only on the NeXTstep OS for the Intel x86 platform.

April: Motorola ships the first 50 MHz
and 66 MHz PowerPC 601. The first generation of PowerPCs has begun. George
Crow, the last NeXT founder besides Jobs, resigns.

May: NeXTstep for Intel Processors (compatible with 486 and Pentium processors)
is released.

November: Apple liscenses PowerPC ROMs to DayStar Digital, so they can
begin creating PPC Upgrade cards. DayStar also later becomes one of the first
Mac OS liscense holders, as well an authority in multiprocessing PowerPC-based
Macs.

March 14: Apple releases the first PowerMacs (6100/60, 7100/66, 8100/80)
using the PowerPC 601.

June: Apple releases System 7.5, with a bunch of new features everybody
already had as shareware.

September: Apple licenses the Mac OS to Radius and Power
Computing.

November-December: IBM and Motorola ship
66 MHz and 80 MHz 603, and a 100 MHz 604. PReP (a.k.a. CHRP, PPCP) Project
begins, which will be able to run Windows 95/NT and the Mac OS in one PowerPC
machine.

An object oriented version of Windows NT (3.5?) is released.

1995

February: IBM and Motorola introduce
the 100 MHz 603e, up to 30% faster than a 603.

April: IBM releases 120 MHz 601.

May: Power Computing releases the
first Mac clones, including the very successful Power 100.

June: Apple releases the first PCI Mac, the $5000 PowerMac 9500/120 using
the new Tsunami motherboard.

January 24: Mac OS 7.6, the first part of Apple's new OS strategy, is released
exactly 13 years after the introduction of the Macintosh.

January 26: Steve Jobs, back as an "advisor" due to the NeXT
deal, announces the future of Rhapsody, Mac OS 8, Allegro, and Sonata, the
Mac, NeXT, and Apple in general at Macworld Expo.

April: Motorola introduces 300 MHz 603e.

June: Motorola introduces 350 MHz Mach
5 604e.

July: President and CEO Gil amelio and VP Ellen Hancock are forced to resign.

July 22: Mac OS 8 is finally released. Selling 1.25 million copies in less
than 2 weeks, it becomes the best-selling software in that period.

August 6: former "advisor" Steve Jobs becomes "de
facto head", announces Microsoft alliance at the Macworld Expo in Boston.
Among the agreements are a cross-platform liscense, $150 million invested
in Apple stocks, an undisclosed ammount of money for Apple (rumored to be
$800 million), the production of MS Office for 5 years, and MS Internet Explorer
as the default browser for the Mac OS.

November 10: At worldwide "Apple Event", Apple releases
the PowerMac
G3. The Apple Store is
also introduced, and a deal is made with CompUSA for
an "Apple store within the store". Though this greatly increases
Mac sales, many disapointed by lack of bigger news.

January 7: Jobs announces a projected $47 million profit for the first
quarter at Macworld Expo, finally bringing Apple back to profitability.

January 31: Power Computing goes
out of business for good. All office computers and supplies are auctioned
off. Owners of Power Computing stock
are mailed Apple stock.

February 4: IBM shows off their 1.1 GHz
(1100 MHz) PowerPC processor.

February 27: After a little over 5 years, the Newton/eMate line has been
discontinued by Apple. Instead, mobile-based products using Mac OS technology
will be developed by 1999. Bandai also liquidates all Bandai @World (Pippin)
consoles. This leaves the Macintosh once again as Apple's only computing
platform.

March 15: Apple "stores within stores" open in all of the
149 CompUSA locations across the country,
answering the cry of many Mac users who loathe the patheticly small, incomplete,
and out of stock Apple sections most retail computer stores provide.

May: Apple announces the iMac and new PowerBook G3 models. Two of the most
innovative machines I've ever seen.

July: Apple announced their third consecutive profit, $101 million, higher
than anyone had expected. "Apple is back" stories surface all over
Internet, print, and TV. Macworld Expo higlights the many features of the
iMac, and reveals Apple's software and hardware strategies for the rest of
the millenium.

July 30: Motorola releases 333, 366, and 400 MHz PowerPC processors. Planned
to be used in the upcoming PowerMac G3 Pro models, as well as a revamped
PowerBook G3, these chips are by far less energy consuming than even the
older, slower G3s. The new G3 processors reportedly gain supercomputer status
by government agencies.

August 7: Apple announces 150,000 preorders for the iMac. Apple goes over
$40/share, highest stock market price in three years.

August 15: iMac is finally released to an incredibly anxious comnsumer
market. Sold in numbers like nothing I've ever seen.

September 1: iMac becomes the second best selling computer for the month
of August, even though it was only on sale for two weeks.
October: Morotorla releases the specs for the upcoming G4 series. The new
processors will push microprocessor technology to the edge of possibility.

October 14: Apple announces its first profitable year since 1995. Mac OS
8.5 is released to an ecstatic audience, promised Copland features appear.
It is found that 43% of all iMac buyers are new to the Macintosh platform,
an unimaginable number of new prospective buyers.